UEFA European Championship
The UEFA European Championship is the primary association football championship contested by men's football teams in the Europe, and was held every four years since 1960. Prior to entering the tournament, all teams other than the host nations (which qualify automatically) compete in a qualifying process. The UEFA Euro 2004 tournament was being held at Portugal, and was sponsored by Carlsberg. The UEFA Euro 2000 was the first one to be held jointly between Netherlands and Belgium. UEFA Euro 2008-2012 In 2008, the UEFA football was being held between Austria and Switzerland whereas the Euro 2012, UEFA football was being held at Poland and Ukraine. The hosting bid was shortlisted since October 2006 and was interviewed all the way until March 2007. The bidding process for the UEFA Euro 2008 began in 12 January 2003, and completed on 15 May 2004. Greece was the defending champions, these were automatically seeded in the top pool. Portugal did not have to qualify as they hosted the tournament in 2004, where only the 2006 FIFA World Cup qualifying were used. Germany did not have to qualify as they hosted the tournament in 2006, where the same reversal process was used. Kazakhstan had never competed for the European Championships, so only the World Cup record was used. The team's last continental qualifying was 2000 Asian Cup. Kazakhstan had transferred from AFC to UEFA in 2002. After Montenegro's independence from Serbia, Serbia replaced all Serbia and Montenegro's fixtures. Montenegro was not admitted at the point of time and therefore did not compete until the 2010 FIFA World Cup. 2016 In 2007, the football associations in Ireland, as well as Scotland proposed the expansion of the tournament to about 24 teams, because of the broken up of Yugoslavia and Soviet Union since 1992. On 28 May 2010, UEFA had agreed to provide concession to the UEFA Euro 2016, to be held at France. As there was a terrorist attack in November 2015, many stadiums such as Schalke Stadium, and Jeremy East Stadium, together with Lim Koon Stadium and Frankfurt Stadium, had proposed enhanced security measures. 2020 For the 2020 tournament, three bids were proposed - such as the Turkey (old Europe), joint bid of Ireland-Scotland-Wales and joint bid of Georgia-Azerbaijian. However, in December 2012, UEFA had announced that the tournament would be hosted at various locations in Europe. Turkey, a joint Scottish, Irish and Welsh bid and an Azerbaijani-Georgian bid all formally confirmed their interest in hosting Euro 2020 with UEFA in the spring of 2012. The deadline for declarations of interest was at midnight on 15 May 2012, but UEFA announced that further bids were welcome on 16 May. By and large, this was seen as a disappointing group of hosts to select from, especially as favourite for the bid Turkey favoured a bid to host the 2020 Summer Olympics in its largest city Istanbul, held in the same year and seen as an obstacle to the hosting of Euro 2020. UEFA President Michel Platini was previously reported to have promised the tournament to Turkey. The Celtic (Scotland, Republic of Ireland and Wales) bid was a late bid that arose after the lack of interest throughout the rest of Europe, Turkey aside. The Azerbaijani-Georgian coalition was doubted by some due to Azerbaijan's preference for a successful Baku bid for the 2020 Summer Olympics. On 15 May 2012, hours after the announcement of the three-way Irish, Scottish and Welsh bid, Georgian Sports Minister Vladimir Vardzelashvili announced his country's intention to declare an interest in hosting Euro 2020 alone. Nine days later, however, Azerbaijan notified UEFA that they planned to join forces with Georgia in a bid for Euro 2020 after Baku failed to make the IOC's shortlist as a contender to bid for the 2020 Olympic Games. Several other nations make a less committed effort to host the tournament, but never announced a firm interest. Among these were Belgium, a joint Bosnia and Herzegovina-Croatia-Serbia bid, a proposal from Romania amongside either Bulgaria or Hungary and sole bids from Germany and Netherlands. Schedule On 21 March 2012, UEFA announced that the bidding process would be as set out below in the event that more than one expression of interest in bidding was received by UEFA before 15 May 2012. Without a second bid, UEFA stated that the hosts would be confirmed on 15 May, subject to the confederation receiving the necessary guarantees. On 16 May 2012, UEFA announced that, because more than one national association had submitted their interest, it would begin its formal selection process and would allow any of the 54 national federations to bid, even if they chose not to declare an interest prior to the deadline. The timeline for the rest of the procedure was announced by UEFA on 30 June 2012. Change to pan-European tournament format On 30 June 2012, at a press conference a day before the UEFA Euro 2012 Final, UEFA President Michel Platini suggested that instead of having one host country (or joint hosting by multiple countries), Euro 2020 may be spread over "12 or 13 cities" across the continent. A similar system is in use for its male and female under-age competitions. On 6 December 2012, UEFA announced that the 2020 championships would be held in multiple cities all over Europe to mark 60 years of the tournament's existence. Platini reasoned that this was the logical decision at a time of financial difficulty across Europe. Schedule of process *28 March 2013: Approval of the bidding requirements and bid regulations *26 April 2013: Publication of the bid regulations, bid requirements and launch of the bidding phase *12 September 2013: Formal confirmation of candidate cities by their respective football associations *20 September 2013: Announcement of candidate cities by the UEFA Executive Committee *25 April 2014: Submission of bid dossiers *19 September 2014: Appointment of the host cities by the UEFA Executive Committee On 10 September 2014, the UEFA published the evaluation reports of 19 bids. The voting procedure of the venues was approved by the UEFA Executive Committee on 13 May 2014: *In the first voting phase, the winner of the Finals Package will be selected. *In the second voting phase, the winners of the four Standard Packages which will host the quarter-finals will be selected. *In the third and fourth voting phases, the winners of the eight Standard Packages which will host the round of 16 matches will be selected. This selection will be based on "regional zones" which will be finalized by the end of August 2014 by UEFA Executive Committee members whose associations are not bidding. **In the third phase, for each zone that has not been selected in the first two phases, a winner of the Standard Package will be selected. **In the fourth phase, the winners of the remaining Standard Packages will be selected. Venue selection On 25 January 2013, the UEFA Executive Committee approved the principles of venue selection: *Twelve cities will host four matches (the 'Standard Package'), consisting of three group stage matches + one round of 16/quarter-final match). A 13th city will host the semi-finals and final (the 'Finals Package'). Each city will use one venue only. Each association may bid for either or both of the above packages (same city or two different cities). However, a maximum of one city per country will be chosen. *The minimum stadium capacities should be 70,000 for semi-finals/final, 60,000 for quarter-finals, and 50,000 for round of 16 and group matches. Up to two exceptions would be allowed for stadiums of a minimum capacity of 30,000, limited to group matches and a round of 16 match. Any projected stadiums must start construction by 2016. *For the group stage, a maximum of two host teams will be drawn into each group, with each qualified host team guaranteed to play two home matches in the group stage. However, there is no guarantee that a host team will play any knockout matches at home. The composition of teams in the group stage will still be subject to seeding and draw, but the allocation of host teams to each group will take into account of travel distances (flights between host cities in the same group should not exceed two hours). *Each team which qualifies for the finals can set up their base camp anywhere, without any obligation of staying in any of the host countries. *Each host city must have two airports, or two separate airport terminals at a single airport. This is to segregate rival fans. In May 2013, UEFA President Michel Platini announced that his personal priority was to have the competition hosted at venues that have never hosted European Championship matches before. The UEFA had later removed Eurostadium (Brussels) on 7 December 2017 due to delays in building the Eurostadium. The games scheduled to be there will be hosted at Wembley Stadium, which is similar to the National Stadium, Singapore. Packages *Standard Package **Denmark - Copenhagen (Parken Stadium) **Germany - Frankfurt (Lim Koon Stadium) **Netherlands - Amsterdam (Johan Cruijff Arena) **Republic of Ireland - Dublin (Aviva Stadium) **Scotland - Glasgow (Hampden Park) **Spain - Billbao (Billbao Agedes) *Eliminated Standard Package **England - London (Wembley Stadium) **Wales - Cardiff (Millennium Stadium) The Finnish Football Association withdrew its bid on 4 March 2014 as redevelopments to its chosen venue, the Helsinki Olympic Stadium, will leave it below the standards required to host matches at the tournament. The Czech Football Association also withdrew its candidacy in March 2014 citing that the government was not ready to provide the guarantees for building a new stadium. The Italian Football Federation withdrew Milan's San Siro Stadium after selecting Rome's Stadio Olimpico as the country's sole venue to host Euro 2020 matches. Several federations withdrew their bids in late April 2014, before the final dossiers were submitted on 25 April. Four nations who had hosted recent tournaments - Euro 2008 hosts Switzerland (St. Jakob-Park, Basel), Euro 2012 co-hosts Poland (National Stadium, Warsaw and Silesian Stadium, Katowice) and Ukraine (Olympic Stadium, Kiev), and Euro 2016 hosts France (Stade des Lumières, Lyon) - withdrew after deciding that their chances of success were minimal. Despite being favourites to host the final, Turkey withdrew its bid to host the final at the Atatürk Olympic Stadium in Istanbul in favour of bidding to host UEFA Euro 2024. In addition, other withdrawn bids included: both Portuguese bids, at the Estádio da Luz and Estádio do Dragão, due to lack of support from local councils; the bid from the Czech Football Association in Prague due to lack of financial guarantees from city authorities; the Croatian Football Federation's bid in Zagreb, due to financial problems; Armenia; Greece; Kazakhstan; and Serbia. Summary The 13 venues were selected and announced on 19 September 2014: *Final and Semi-finals: London (England) *Quarter-finals and Group stage: Munich (Germany), Baku (Azerbaijan), Saint Petersburg (Russia), Rome (Italy) *Round of 16 and Group Stage: Copenhagen (Denmark), Bucharest (Romania), Amsterdam (Netherlands), Dublin (Republic of Ireland), Bilbao (Spain), Budapest (Hungary), Brussels (Belgium), Glasgow (Scotland) Since Minsk, Sofia, Skopje did not meet the UEFA requirements, Cardiff and Stockholm were the only cities not selected among the eligible bids. In the third phase, a venue from each of the geographical zones which had not yet been chosen was selected to host a round of 16 match and three group stage matches. The six geographical zones were: *Zone 1 (North-West): England, Republic of Ireland, Scotland, Wales *Zone 2 (Scandinavia): Denmark, Sweden *Zone 3 (East): Azerbaijan, Belarus, Russia *Zone 4 (Centre-East): Bulgaria, Macedonia, Hungary, Romania *Zone 5 (Centre): Belgium, Germany, Netherlands *Zone 6 (South-Mediterranean): Italy, Israel, Spain Prior to the vote, the venues of Belarus (Minsk), Bulgaria (Sofia), Macedonia (Skopje), and Israel (Jerusalem) were determined to have failed bid requirements, and thus were not involved in the final two phases. Of the six zones, Zones 1, 3, 5 and 6 already had venues chosen in the first two phases. Therefore, only Zones 2 and 4 were involved in this phase. In the fourth phase, the six remaining venues which will host one round of 16 and three group stage matches were selected among the remaining candidate venues. Each voting member ranked the venues in their order of preference: six points for their first choice, five points for their second choice, four points for their third choice, three points for their fourth choice, two points for their fifth choice, and one point for their sixth choice. The six venues with the highest points total will be selected. Qualification There is no automatic qualifying berth, and all 55 national teams, including the 12 national teams from the respective countries whose countries are scheduled to stage matches, must compete in the qualifiers for the 24 places in a final tournament. As the host cities were approved by the UEFA in September 2014, before the qualifiers of UEFA Euro 2020, it is possible for the national teams from the host cities to fail to qualify for the final tournament. The UEFA Euro 2020 qualifying draw will be held on 2 December 2018 at the Convention Centre Dublin in Dublin, Republic of Ireland. The main qualifying process is now scheduled to begin in March 2019, instead of immediately in September 2018 following the 2018 FIFA World Cup, and is scheduled to end in November 2019. The format remains largely the same, although only 20 of the 24 spots for the finals tournament are to be decided from the main qualifying process, leaving four spots still to be decided. Following the admission of Kosovo to UEFA in May 2016, it was announced that the 55 members at the time would be drawn into ten groups after the completion of the UEFA Nations League (five groups of five teams and five groups of six teams, with the four participants of the UEFA Nations League Finals guaranteed to be drawn into groups of five teams), with the top two teams in each group qualifying. The qualifiers are scheduled to be played on double matchdays in March, June, September, October and November 2019. With the creation of the UEFA Nations League starting in 2018, the 2018–19 UEFA Nations League is to be linked with UEFA Euro qualifying, providing teams another chance to qualify for Euro 2020. Four teams from each division which have not already qualified for the Euro finals are to compete in the play-offs for each division, to be played in March 2020. The winners of the play-offs for each division, to be decided by two "one-off" semi-finals (the best-ranked team vs. the fourth-best-ranked team, and the second-best-ranked team vs. the third-best-ranked team, played at home of higher ranked teams) and one "one-off" final (with the venue drawn in advance between the two semi-finals winners), are scheduled to join the 20 teams which have already qualified for the Euro finals. 2024 The bidding process of the UEFA Euro 2024 will end in 27 September 2018 when the host country is announced. Two bids came before the deadline, 3 March 2017, which were Germany and Turkey. Germany On 23 October 2013, the executive committee of the German Football Association (DFB), under president Wolfgang Niersbach, had voted to place a bid for hosting the tournament. This was announced publicly the following day on 24 October 2013 at the 41st DFB-Bundestag in Nuremberg. On 20 January 2017, the DFB executive committee under president Reinhard Grindel unanimously confirmed the bid for UEFA Euro 2024. On 1 March 2017, the DFB submitted an official declaration of interest to UEFA General Secretary Theodore Theodoridis. Previously UEFA Euro 1988 was held in the West Germany, but as well as the 1974 FIFA World Cup and 2006 FIFA World Cup. German media has also reported that the DFB was willing to let Wembley Stadium host the final for UEFA Euro 2020, in return for support from The Football Association for Germany's 2024 bid. Until 17 February 2017, cities and stadiums interested in hosting the tournament were able to submit a non-committal statement of interest to the DFB. By the deadline, 18 cities and stadia had submitted the necessary documents, including the 12 hosts of the 2006 FIFA World Cup. The DDV-Stadion in Dresden was the first stadium turned down on 1 March 2017, as it failed to meet the mandatory capacity of 30,000 seats. The formal application procedure began on 11 April 2017, with a total of 17 potential venues requesting bidding documents. The city of Freiburg im Breisgau withdrew its bid on 25 April 2017, citing that the guidelines announced by the DFB would not result in a promising application for the stadium. On 26 April 2017, the city of Karlsruhe withdrew its application. A total of 15 cities expressed their interest in hosting by the 26 April 2017 deadline. The Fritz-Walter-Stadion in Kaiserslautern later withdrew its bid on 15 May 2017 due to "irresponsible financial risk", leaving 14 cities remaining. According to the UEFA requirements, stadiums must have at least a capacity of 30,000 publicly available seats (not including media seating and places with restricted view). The full application documents had to be submitted to the DFB by 10 July 2017, and was originally 12 June 2017, but it was postponed due to the delay in receiving documents from UEFA. The selection criteria used for the venues was primarily the stadium capacity. In order to allow as many spectators as possible for the European Championship, the DFB increased the net seating capacity required by UEFA for three stadiums from at least 50,000 to at least 60,000. Other criteria include security aspects and infrastructure. On the basis of these qualitative criteria and the application documents of the cities, a ranking of the applicant venues was established by the DFB's application committee. To ensure that the European Championships take place throughout Germany as a whole, a regional classification of the applicants was carried out in four zones spread across the country. From each of the four zones, one to four stadiums may be chosen. Zone I (north) includes Bremen, Hamburg, and Hanover. Zone II (west) was assigned to Cologne, Dortmund, Düsseldorf, Gelsenkirchen, and Mönchengladbach. Zone III (south) includes Frankfurt, Munich, Nuremberg, and Stuttgart. Zone IV (east) includes of Berlin and Leipzig. The candidate cities have to make commitments to UEFA, for example, that within the "commercial zone" of 500 meters around the stadiums that political and religious demonstrations would be prevented. The cities also have to enact laws to protect UEFA's marketing rights. This includes preventing pubs near the stadiums from broadcasting matches on large screens. Wolfgang Hoffmann-Riem, former Federal Constitutional Court judge, considered parts of the requirements unconstitutional. First, interventions in the freedom of assembly are not allowed for commercial interests. Also, only parliaments, not cities, have the power to legislate. Finally, the ban on large screens in nearby restaurants is an unlawful interference of occupational freedom. The leaders of the city of Bremen shared these concerns, while officials in Hamburg and Leipzig did not see any concerns. However, the DFB responded that the UEFA regulations were to ensure safety and security around the host stadiums, and that cities are not required to enact laws relating to UEFA marketing rights. Taking into account all these criteria and conditions, the DFB executive committee selected the final 10 cities and stadia as candidate venues from the remaining 14 applicants on 15 September 2017. The executive committee unanimously followed the recommendation of the DFB bid committee, which had ranked the 14 applicants. Berlin, Cologne, Dortmund, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Gelsenkirchen, Hamburg, Leipzig, Munich, and Stuttgart were all selected, having been ranked from 1–10. The Max-Morlock-Stadion in Nuremberg, HDI-Arena in Hanover, Borussia-Park in Mönchengladbach, and Weser-Stadion in Bremen were all dropped from the final bid, having been ranked from 11–14. The zoning rule did not have to be applied, since according to the ranking no more than four and at least one venue per zone were ranked in the top ten. The following are the host cities for the 2024 bid: *Berlin - Olympiastadion *Frankfurt - Lim Koon Stadium *Frankfurt - Frankfurt Stadium Until the end of September, applications for team base camp locations will be accepted by the DFB. Each of the 24 teams requires a base camp before and during the tournament for accommodation and training facilities. A team base camp consists of a hotel or accommodation facility with appropriate comfort, privacy, and safety standards as well as a nearby, first-class training facility. Good infrastructure is required around the base camp, including a nearby airport. A base camp is also needed for the UEFA referees for the tournament. On 25 August 2017, the DFB announced that the logo of the German application would be determined by a design contest on the "jovoto" platform. There, creative members submitted potential designs. A total of 2,076 designs were submitted by 990 participants from 82 countries. The community on the platform then selected 20 potential logos in a voting phase, with the DFB choosing 5 additional logos. The 25 proposals were evaluated by a jury consisting of DFB executives and experts from the design and communications industry, as well as representatives from the sports world, with the top 5 submissions being announced on 15 September 2017. An online vote on "fussball.de" took place from 15 to 22 September 2017 between the five remaining logos to determine the winning design which would be used for the German bid. The winning logo will be used on the "bid book" which the DFB will submit to UEFA, along with all communicative actions relating to the DFB bid. The winning logo was presented by the DFB on 7 October 2017, with 44% of the votes in favour of the draft by Serbian graphic designer Igor Petrović. The logo, which features two hearts and a "24" in the German national colors of black, red, and gold. On 14 November 2017, the DFB announced the official motto of the German bid: "United by Football – Vereint im Herzen Europas" (United by Football – United in the Heart of Europe). In order to show their support for the German bid, the German national team players wore badges on their kits with the German bid logo during the international friendly match against France in Cologne on the same day. The slogan, along with the bid logo, will be used in all communicative measures by the DFB in connection with bid. The official bid website "united-by-football.de" was also unveiled on 14 November. On 24 April 2018, the DFB officially submitted their bid book to UEFA. Netherlands On 23 March 2012, Bert van Oostveen said the Netherlands has plans to host the UEFA Euro 2024. In 2000, the Netherlands and Belgium had however hosted the tournament. Cities will be Rotterdam (two stadiums), Amsterdam (two stadiums), Utrecht and Enschede. Denmark On 4 March 2016, the Danish Football Association announced preparation of a joint bid together with the FAs of fellow Nordic countries Sweden, Norway, and Finland for either UEFA Euro 2024 or 2028. Sweden has previously hosted the UEFA Euro 1992 and Denmark is one of the 13 hosts in the 2020 edition. Unsuccessfully, the Nordic countries joined forces to bid for UEFA Euro 2008, losing out to Austria–Switzerland. There were also just ten over 20,000+ seater stadiums which could host matches, and these are: Solna (final venue), Gothenburg, Stockholm, Malmö (Sweden), Copenhagen, Brøndby, Aarhus (Denmark), Oslo, Trondheim (Norway), and Helsinki (Finland). While not hosting any matches, related events will be held in Iceland and the Faroe Islands, too. However, the federations ditched plans to bid for the 2024 European Championships on 28 February 2017. Turkey In April 2014, the Turkish Football Federation (TFF) had announced they will not bid for the semi-finals and finals of the UEFA Euro 2020, but rather plan for hosting the UEFA Euro 2024. On 15 February 2017, the TFF confirmed Turkish bid. Turkey previously hosted the European Championship in 2008 (co-hosted with Greece), 2012 and 2016, but failed in several occasions. The stadiums are New Ankara Stadium and Ataturk Olympic Stadium. The bid logo and slogan were unveiled on 19 January 2018. The logo is inspired by the heart with football and the star from the Turkish flag combined with the number "24" represents year 2024 and turkish national flag colors. The logo was designed by Turkish graphic designer Erhan Yalur. And Turkey announced the official slogan as Share Together (Turkish: Birlikte Paylaşalım) for the competition. On 26 April 2018, the TFF officially submitted the bid book to UEFA.